Who needs a retirement plan!
Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Dear Ely,
I’m fiscally retarded, and I need your help. I just finished college and started my first real job, where I’m finally making some serious bank. I can think of a thousand ways to spend my money – all of them fun and most of them naughty. But now that I’m an adult, I’ve got this nagging little voice in my head telling me that I should be more responsible with my finances. Everyone – family, friends, co-workers, that old dude on the TV commercials – tells me I should save for retirement. It seems like a good idea, but all those retirement plans confuse me. What should I do?
Sincerely,
Responsible Johnny
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Dear Responsible Johnny,
What are you, stupid? You’re in your early twenties and you’re going to start saving for retirement, some hazy goal that’s more than forty years away? Dumb!
You’re young! You should be spending your money to have fun NOW rather than worrying about life when you’re old and feeble. I guarantee you, you’ll enjoy your money more now than you will when you’re a decrepit old man. Live it up! Seize the day! Party your youth away!
Because guess what, bro. There’s no guarantee that your retirement will ever get here. There are a million things out there that can kill you long before you reach old age. It’s a scary world. Consider these totally true and not-at-all-made-up statistics:
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Flying squirrel attack!
Photo by Gene Glaser. SourceClimate scientists, fear mongers, and false prophets predict a 93.4% chance that the world will end by 2030;
- Every year, 8,686 men explode after driving their cars into dynamite factories – 1,969 do it on purpose;
- 2% of men die by falling out of trees after being blinded in a flying squirrel attack;
- Each year, 53,287 men die of shame after sexing an ugly chick (and are the ugly chicks ever arrested for manslaughter? No!);
- 3% of men embarrassingly choke to death on pickles while watching porn.
The moral of the story is: you’re probably going to die soon. You’ll almost definitely kick the bucket before you get to retire. So why bother saving your money? Blow it all on good times now.
And if you do somehow survive the labyrinth of death traps that the universe has sadistically set out for you, you’ll still have options when you reach old age. You can just keep on working until the day you die (provided that your employer still wants your musty old ass around). You can sell all your possessions – by that point you’ll probably have some antiques laying around that can fetch you some solid cash. You can sell your blood or your sperm – there’s always a big market out there for bodily fluids. Or you can sell your body to an old withered widow who needs some special attention. That would make a pretty sweet final chapter of your life: The Wrinkled Gigolo. Maybe you’ll even die while servicing the silver fox. Way to go out with a bang!
Peace, Love, and Death Before Retirement,
Ely North
